It’s not as if the U.S. is the Middle East or Russia where gays face death or oppression simply because of their sexual orientation. In this country, the LGBT movement is on a roll.

Legalized same-sex marriage is rapidly spreading among the states, and the U.S. Supreme Court is on the verge of declaring it a constitutional right.

Transgender accommodation in many forms is the latest thing. Public acceptance of the LGBT lifestyle is at an all-time high, especially among the young, who have been conditioned by public education, the liberal media and the entertainment world to be fully approving.

According to the most recent National Health Interview Survey, 96.6 percent of adults self-identify as heterosexual, 1.6 percent as gay or lesbian, 0.7 percent as bisexual and 1.1 percent as “something else.” For a tiny fraction of the population, the LGBT cohort has been remarkably successful in shaping popular culture and public policy.

So why the massive overreaction to the temperate attempt by defenders of religious freedom to carve out a little protection for individual rights under various state versions of the federal Religious Freedom Restoration Act? This law has been on the books since 1993, signed by President Clinton after winning near-unanimous approval in Congress. The calls for a boycott of Indiana for adding its approval to that of other states is positively absurd. There’s nothing in the federal or state RFRAs that remotely threatens LGBT rights.

At play here is a heavy-handed political strategy to kill this RFRA flea with a nuclear bomb as a shot across the bow to any who would defy LGBT political correctness. It is compounded by an incorrect notion that discrimination under any and all circumstances is flatly illegal. That’s simply not true. There’s wiggle room for reason and common sense. Anti-discrimination laws identify “protected classes” subject to special scrutiny. Among the characteristics of those classes are race, color, religion, sex, age and disability. Let’s consider some hypothetical situations.

Age: An 80-year-old woman applies for a job as a server a Hooters. The company’s business model regards servers also as entertainers for a mostly male audience. It hires young, attractive, buxom women. That hiring profile doesn’t arbitrarily or illegally discriminate.

Disability: A paralyzed man applies for a job as a Denver Broncos tight end. Do I need to elaborate?

Religion: A Muslim who has publicly called for “death to all infidels” applies for a job at a Jewish synagogue.

Then there are laws prohibiting discrimination at places of “public accommodation,” including restaurants, hotels, theaters and retail stores.

A black man wants to rent a standard tuxedo from a retail clothier. He can’t legally be denied because of his race. A Grand Dragon of the KKK demands that a black tailor make him a custom white robe with images of blacks being lynched. You make the call.

A photographer in his shop asked to shoot a passport photo for a gay man and his partner can’t legally refuse because of his religious objection to that sexual preference. But can’t he refuse, as a matter of freedom of disassociation, to take a job shooting photos at a gay wedding?

Regardless of the law on same-sex marriage or anything else, people are free to disapprove based on their beliefs — religious or otherwise. This is not a criminal offense in a free society. All kinds of people approve or disapprove of all kinds of things. Some militant gays and lesbians have even defamed heterosexuals as “breeders.” Should we call out the thought police? Tolerance is a two-way street.

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